Antilogy, dialectic and dialectic’s objects in Plato’s Phaedrus

Abstract

Plato’s Phaedrus is a dialogue in which rhetoric is not only discussed, but also displayed. The first half of the plot depicts a rhetorical contest in which Socrates himself offers two opposite speeches on love, a kind of dissoi logoi. The current paper tries to explain that the second half of the dialogue offers the necessary keys to understand that for Plato true rhetoric is nothing but dialectic and that beyond the apparent antilogic exercise carried out by Socrates there can be found philosopher’s dialectical practice itself. Last but not least, the article defends that dialectic does not necessarily deal with Forms.